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A marmalade which is every bit as good as its more expensive rivals

During the week I'm generally in a rush to get to work and mainly settle for mashed banana and yoghurt with a few flaked almonds for my breakfast but at the weekend I prefer to have a more leisurely first meal of the day and frequently opt for toast and marmalade. Like many people nowadays, I've seen the cost of food shopping rocketing and so have recently been doing more of my food shopping at Aldi. My local Aldi store is ironically situated where the Waitrose supermarket used to be; a case of going from the sublimely expensive to the ridiculously cheap. One of the surprise finds for me is the Grandessa brand of jams and preserves, exclusive to Aldi, and the Grandessa marmalades are particularly tasty and currently sell at a price of 59p for a 454g jar which certainly won't break the bank.

Appearance:

Aldi is, of course, a no frills store and therefore their Grandessa marmalades come in a pretty basic container. The shape is slightly different, however, in that part of the jar is decagonal. (I had to look up the name of a 10 sided shape as it didn't immediately spring to mind.) The metal screw top has a picture of oranges printed onto it which makes the whole thing not too unattractive when put on the table. The glass jars are recyclable but I've found that because of the pictorial lids and the slightly unusual shaped jars, these jars are ideal for home made orange curd which I gave out to friends as Christmas presents last year. (Just call me a cheapskate!)

The marmalade itself is an excellent consistency, being not too set and not too runny and it holds its shape on the knife or spoon. There's also a good balance of orange shred to jelly. The jelly itself is a good orange colour and only slightly opaque and the shreds are all a fairly uniform length of about an inch.

Taste:

I'm no marmalade connoisseur but my preference is for one with a slightly bitter flavour and the Grandessa marmalade doesn't disappoint in that respect. It has the perfect balance between sweet and sharp and has a delicious tang without leaving a bitter aftertaste. It's also sweet enough to use not only as a spread on toast but as a topping for a steamed or baked pudding and even warmed through and used as an orange sauce.

Ingredients and nutritional value:

Being a preserve, there is a hefty amount of sugar in this product with 67g of sugar per 100g and 35g of oranges per 100g. There is also added sugar in the form of glucose-fructose syrup, so not all that good for your teeth and this is the source of most of the calories which work out at 39 calories for a 15g serving which is probably about a couple of teaspoonsful.

This marmalade is suitable for vegetarians and doesn't contain gluten. Aldi recommend that once opened, it's stored in the fridge where it should last for two weeks. Personally, I've found it lasts much longer than that. Sugar is a preservative which is one of the reasons jam and marmalade recipes use so much sugar. It's when other things are introduced into the product, such as traces of butter, that the bacteria gets to work. If you use a separate spoon to put the jam onto the toast and then spread with your knife, the product will last for much longer than the recommended two weeks.

In summary:

To my mind, this is a case where a cheap product is every bit as good as its more expensive counterparts. It's tangy and tasty and at 59p a jar will help to keep the food bills down as well. It's also environmentally friendly as every part of the product, can be consumed or recycled.

Grandessa also do a lemon shred marmalade which is equally delicious and, again, the jar has a pictorial lid so is great to reuse for home made lemon curd. Guess what I'm making for Christmas presents this year!

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It's ok but not all that!

I love the Aldi Thick Cut 'Grandessa' Marmalade and when they didn't have it in stock my Mum had a dilema knowing I'd be gutted without my usual sticky delight so she felt she had no other option but to buy the fine cut version of the same thing for me. I wasn't too chuffed to be honest when I saw it wasn't thick cut marmalade!

The Packaging:

454g glass jar with a black screw on/on lid to the top of it. On the front there is an orange label and on that there is a picture of sliced oranges and I'm told it is deliciously Fruity Grandessa Orange Marmalade 'Fine Cut' and then I'm told it contains 35% fruit and there is an at a glance nutritional chart shown. On the back label other information includes ingreidents, storage instructions are given, there is a full nutritional chart on there, size is stated and contact details for Aldi are given. It's a nice enough informative jar and easy to open and informative enough etc.

The Marmalade:

Light orange and sort of transparent and jelly like with dark orange, small, thin shreds of orange peel. It has a zesty smell to it as well as tasting of oranges (and only of oranges). It is sweet with a slight undertone of bitterness from the rind. It's very sweet in a naturally sweet way and it's incredibly easy to spread due to it's rather sloppy consistency.

Verdict:

To me it tastes nice enough and it really is a fine cut marmalade. Nicely sweet but not overly so the only problem I feel that this has is that when you first buy, open and use it it is set rather firm but the more you use it the more it turns to slush in the jar and by the time you get half way down the jar it's pretty pourable in fact. Not for me this one purely on consistency however if you like light tasting, fresh marmalade's you don't need to use a lot of then this could be right up your street!